Elon Musk's social media network X has provoked major backlash after users employed its AI chatbot Grok to manipulate images of females by taking off their clothing.
Multiple instances have emerged where the tool has been used to remove clothing from female subjects to show them in swimwear without consent, as well as to insert them in sexually explicit contexts.
Company Response and Legal Position
XAI, the organization behind Grok, remained silent to questions, except for an auto-reply message stating "legacy media lies".
A Home Office spokesperson stated that legislation is being brought forward to outlaw nudification technology. Under a upcoming criminal offence, anyone who distributed such technology would "be subject to a prison sentence and heavy fines".
"The platform is capable of halting these types of abuse if they wanted to," said a law professor, adding they "appear to enjoy a lack of consequences."
Oversight Body Stance and Platform Functionality
The regulator Ofcom said technology companies must "consider the risk" of people seeing illegal content on their networks, but stopped short of confirming whether it was presently examining X or Grok in concerning artificial intelligence pictures.
Grok is a no-cost artificial intelligence—with some paid-for functions—which reacts to X users' queries when they reference it in a message.
It is frequently used to give reactions or further context to other users' remarks, but people on X are also can modify an posted image through its AI image editing feature.
History of Criticism and Policy
The tool has been condemned for permitting users to create images and clips with nudity and sexualised material, and it was earlier alleged to have been involved in generating sexually explicit material of public figures.
"The platform has been enabling the generation and distribution of these pictures for months without taking any action and we have not witnessed any action by regulators," the expert added.
XAI's own acceptable use policy prohibits "portraying likenesses of persons in a graphic fashion".
In a statement, Ofcom said it was unlawful to "make or share non-consensual intimate images or child sexual abuse material" and clarified this applied to sexual deepfakes made with AI.
It said platforms such as X were mandated to take "necessary actions" to "lessen the risk" of users viewing unlawful material on their services and to take down it quickly when they learn of it.
